We Rely On Your Support: Have you heard of Phoronix Premium? It's what complements advertisements on this site for our premium ad-free service. For as little as $3 USD per month, you can help support our site while the funds generated allow us to keep doing Linux hardware reviews, performance benchmarking, maintain our community forums, and much more. You can also consider a tip via PayPal.

Throughout Pripyat you can also find items that have been looted
by thieves from sink faucets to electrical wire. Walking through this four-story
school was definitely an interesting experience and one of the most unique to
walk through among the many buildings of Pripyat.

Some of the rooms in different Pripyat buildings are now empty
as months and years after the accident, some atomic refugees from Pripyat were
allowed to return to collect some of their belongings. Liquidators and other personnel
also took advantage of some of the leftover furniture and other belongings when
they began living in the area. Like the missing electrical wire and toilet fixtures,
looters took some of the other items.

Compared to some of the villages within Chernobyl's Exclusion
Zone, more of the buildings are still standing since some were used following
the disaster and others just not contaminated nearly as much. When driving through
the Chernobyl area it is very common to see a mound of dirt with a nuclear warning
sign atop, which signifies where a building once stood and where there are still
unsafe levels of radiation.

The fallout from this Chernobyl event was not contained to just
this thirty kilometer zone, but measurable amounts of nuclear matter were found
in Sweden and other European countries. A radioactive cloud also reportedly reached
as far away as France and Italy following the April 1986 disaster. There are increased
rates in Thyroid cancer among children in other parts of Europe that can be traced
back to lead and nuclear material that escaped into the atmosphere during the
Chernobyl explosion and resulting fire that propelled deadly material more than
one-thousand kilometers into the atmosphere. There are also still food restrictions
that continue to be enforced for places as far away as the United Kingdom because
of contaminated fields and livestock.

Another stop on this two-day journey of Chernobyl was the town
of Chernobyl itself. The Chernobyl town is located about ten miles away from the
reactor plant itself and was founded in 1932, but it too is more or less a "ghost
town" with only a few life-long residents and scientists/government officials
living within the area. Its residents like those from Pripyat became atomic refugees
and were forced to migrate to Slavutych. One of the buildings for "The Ministry
of Ukraine of Emergencies and Affairs of Population Protection from the Consequences
of Chernobyl Catastrophe" is also within the area.

There is also a monument within the Chernobyl town that was constructed
by the town's firefighters. This monument was dedicated to their comrade first
responders that lost their lives as being the first responders to the nuclear
fire in late April of 1986.

While Chernobyl's reactors have been off-line for years, there
still are workers at the site that are still working to remove the spent nuclear
fuel rods and constructing a permanent storage facility for this very hazardous
waste. Even removing the nuclear power equipment is expected to take at least
another decade. Also being worked on at this site is the New Safe Confinement.
Built following the nuclear disaster was the sarcophagus that was made of
concrete, steel, and other materials in the months after the accident to contain
the nuclear fallout. The sarcophagus did help in preventing
greater amounts of radioactive material from escaping into the atmosphere, but
it's fallen into a state of disrepair with cracks appearing along the roof and
the entire structure is considered unstable and being at a risk of collapse.

The mission at Phoronix since 2004 has centered around enriching the Linux hardware experience. In addition to supporting our site through advertisements, you can help by subscribing to Phoronix Premium. You can also use our Amazon.com or NewEgg.com shopping links when making online purchases or contribute to Phoronix through a PayPal tip.